The Walking Dead: 10 Questions And Answers To Current Mysteries

7. Was The Prison Flu Epidemic A New Mutation Of The Zombie Virus?

Much of the early part of season four was centred around the events of the nasty flu epidemic that swept through the prison population. For lack of a better term, it consumed a lot of story time and made audiences witness a whole new threat beyond the zombies and harmful groups that reside beyond the prison walls and populate this world. The sickness was never really explained or rationalised other than that it was a deadly flu that seemed to pop up out of nowhere and was ultimately taken care of with some special Herschel tea and meds. For the sake of the narrative it's possible that the flu was just a one time thing but there's no denying that the world has changed and that killer viruses are now all over the place. Although we know that the zombie virus is inside of everyone and that death will cause your reanimation, it's possible to believe that the virus may have mutated further and is now airborne. The epidemic was not an isolated incident that just took place in the prison as the characters noticed walkers outside of the prison perimeter that appeared to have a similar appearance to those that had turned in the prison.